The tender consists of two stages:• selection of candidates which will be invited to submit a proposal in the second stage, and• evaluation of the proposals submitted by selected candidates.

At the end of the December, the first detailed technical design of the railway in Estonia, from Pärnu to Rapla, and in Lithuania, from Kaunas to Ramygala, were announced. However, the submission deadline for both tenders has been extended to February 21.

“With this tender for the detailed technical design of the first 57km of Rail Baltica railway track in Latvia we have launched the Rail Baltica detailed technical design preparation process in all three Baltic countries,” says Mr Jean-Marc Bedmar, senior engineer with RB Rail. “Nevertheless, these three competitions are only a few of many upcoming railway design tenders to be carried out until 2022 in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.

The Rail Baltica project involves building an 870km electrified standard-gauge railway linking the three Baltic capitals of Tallinn, Estonia, Riga, Latvia, and Vilnius, Lithuanian with a connection to the European standard-gauge network in Poland. The railway will be designed for operation by 240km/h passenger trains and 120km/h freight trains and will form part of the European Union’s North Sea Baltic TEN-T corridor.